


The New Old-Fashioned Way

by earlgreyhot



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Banter, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Tree, F/M, Flirting, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:22:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27596792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlgreyhot/pseuds/earlgreyhot
Summary: Bringing home a Christmas tree is the least of Draco and Hermione's problems, not when they can't agree on how to decorate it.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Comments: 8
Kudos: 50
Collections: round 12 2020





	The New Old-Fashioned Way

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 12th round of Dramione Duet! :) My prompt was "Draco and Hermione have different opinions on how to decorate the Christmas tree..." 
> 
> Thank you to my betas, abbymary and Duelsey32. ♥

“Left, go left!  _ Wait, no! _ Right, go right!”

“Granger…”

“I mean, it! Right, go right!”

Draco and Hermione scurried around a corner into an alleyway, holding on to either side the Christmas tree they had found in the artisanal market they had stumbled across on the town center of their quaint village. Smiling, she breathed in the fresh, earthy smell of the pine—a real tree, less plastic generated in the world that way. It smelled like all those wonderful memories from Hogwarts with the Christmas tree so massive that Hagrid struggled to carry it into the Great Hall.

“It stinks,” whined Draco.

Hermione reeled. “It  _ what _ ?”

“Blimey, not the tree. This alley. Did you have to pick the one with all the garbage?”

“It’ll only be a second. Do you want to Apparate or shall I do it?”

“Is that even a question? I’m the only reason this tree didn’t drag through the snow.”

Hermione blushed, biting her lip. She glanced around the thick branches and caught his eye, her cheek growing hotter at Draco’s teasing smirk.

“Well, all right. You hug the tree. I’ll hug you. Think about home.”

They slowly shifted the brunt weight onto him, and Hermione tried not to feel her pride wound at how easily he held the entire tree. The little bit of it she had held up had been heavy enough to hurt her arms.

She raked a look over him as he shifted into position, hugging the tree close.

His back arched as the tree’s weight rebelled against him. His jumper fitted closely to his back, his shoulders broad and delicious beneath the knitwear. She had made the jumper herself last Christmas, a fair isle knitting pattern she designed for Draco. A snowflake motif repeated over his chest and shoulders. Molly Weasley had asked for Draco’s measurements so she could knit him an annual Weasley jumper, but Hermione’s stomach went cold at the idea of Draco wearing a jumper knitted by Molly before ever wearing her own. So, she knitted her jumper first, then gave Molly the measurements after Draco debuted the jumper at the Burrow.

“Hermione?” said Draco, muffled.

Not calling her Granger, then. She was always Hermione when he wanted something.

Biting her cheek, she grabbed his arm tightly and Apparated them home. Her stomach pinched and head hurt as they traveled in seconds across town, sifted through the protective charms guarding their flat, and then landed in the middle of their tiny living room.

As a girl, she hadn’t fancied herself the type to live at home with her parents well into her twenties, only to move out to live with a man, but St. Mungo’s had needed over a year to retrieve all of her parents’ memories. She still missed her parents. The wound of their Obliviations for her were still as painful as when she cast the spells. They did not live that far away, only thirty minutes by car. Seconds by Apparation.

That proximity to her parents was part of Draco and Hermione’s compromise. Hermione had the final say on rent, but Draco chose the location. And he chose the next town over from her parents and childhood home.

Draco had told her that family was important, family was forever.

Draco did not have the best relationship with his parents after his relationship with Astoria Greengrass. She was part of an old pureblood family but did not agree with their blood prejudice. She had helped Draco see the pathway toward tolerance, and he kept it even after they broke up. Only Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy had not liked that change, even when Astoria was no longer in the picture. Falling in love with a Muggleborn who helped bring down Voldemort had been the final nail in that coffin.

Hermione stood beside the bookshelves to give Draco space as he maneuvered around tables and chairs to the empty corner that they had designated for the Christmas tree. She smiled wistfully as Draco took the smallest, grumpiest steps.

Draco dropped the tree in place and stepped back. “Compliment me, Granger.”

She stepped through the maze of furniture and stood beside him. She looked at him and not the tree. Somewhere in the exertion between the Christmas Market and their living room, his hair mussed up. “Very nice,” she said.

His eyebrows drew together. “That’s all you can do? Honestly.”

“I am being honest,” she said, then rose on her tip toes to kiss his cheek. 

Draco smirked at the tree, pleased.

Hermione retrieved a box of ornaments they had stacked earlier on the coffee table. Some boxes her parents had donated for their first Christmas together in the flat. “We better start decorating.”

Draco shook his wrist to retrieve the wand hidden away in his sleeve. “I’ve always wanted to try out spells the house-elves used.”

Hermione bristled. “Nonsense. We’re not using magic.”

“It’s a time-honored tradition,” said Draco.

“You just said the house-elves did it every year.”

“Exactly. Every year. That’s tradition.”

Hermione flicked a look over him. “Millenia of evolution gave us opposable thumbs,” said Hermione. “They’re more than enough to hang up ornaments and string lights around a tree.”

Draco grabbed a box of ornaments, jingling the bells inside. His knuckles and sinews shifted as he sorted through the ornaments, a little hair over his wrists that the sleeve of his jumper could not hide.

Hermione swallowed down a tickle in her throat and ran a hand over her plaited hair.

“There’s so many in here,” he said, “and we still have the lights, tinsel, popcorn… We’ll be here for hours, but with magic, it’d take no time at all.”

“Yes, well—” Hermione tore her gaze away from his hands. “Well, I suppose we  _ could  _ compromise. You do half with magic. I do the other half by—by hand.”

“Right.”

Draco waved his wand over the box, and every single ornament flew into the air. With another wave, he sent the ornaments to the tree. They danced and wove around the tree, hopping onto branches and burrowing cozily into the pine. In a matter of seconds, the ornaments settled into place. Draco went to get another box.

Begrudgingly, Hermione grabbed an ornament of a reindeer with a wrapped gift on its back and stepped over to the tree, but paused by the branches, toiling over the best place for the reindeer. Chewing on her lip, she concentrated hard. Eventually, she stretched out her arm and pinned the ornament to the branches. She breathed in the fresh pine smell before stepping back to admire the latest edition.

“Rather slow, isn’t it?” drawled Draco. He waved his wand and sent the ornaments in his box soaring to the tree.

Hermione ignored him and reached blindly inside the box for another ornament, grabbing the first one she touched.

She looked down at it and flushed so deeply, she dipped her chin to hide her burning cheeks.

In her hand was an ornament she had never seen before. And she knew every single ornament. It was a holiday tradition to decorate the tree by hand. No, this was brand new, bought uniquely for them. Her parents had extended the effort of hopping into the family car, driving into town, and entering shop after shop after shop only to find, purchase, and gift a brand-new ornament of a mistletoe.

Her parents had bought her mistletoe.

Draco stepped closer. Her entire body stood on alert from the proximity.

“That one ought to go up high,” said Draco. “But not too high, we haven’t placed the star yet and that’s the highest place available. Speaking of the star, are you sure you don’t need any help? You’re not tall enough to reach the top without climbing the tree, and I don’t think the branches can support you.”

Hermione straightened her shoulders. “Never mind, you.”

Draco snickered.

She reached high to hang up the mistletoe. A branch poked her belly. She rose on the tips of her toes to evade it.

“Need help?” said Draco.

Just as her response to decline grazed the tip of her tongue, Draco came up from behind her and enveloped her between his arms, one hand lying over her hip, his thumb skirting above her jumper and touching her bare skin. His hands were cold, frigid against her skin toasty warmth from the wool jumper she wore. As she let go of the mistletoe and stepped back down onto her heels, her back pressed firmly against him, and he hugged her close. She collapsed against him. He didn’t buckle against her weight.

He kissed over her ears, whispering into her ear. “Very nice.”

His voice, spoken so lowly, reverberated through her entire body. She leaned further into him. This close, when she breathed, his light cologne fragranced every inhale.

“Erm, I—” She licked her lips, clearing her throat. “I ought to—to continue…”

He chuckled in her ear, then kissed her and nibbled her lobe. She shivered. She could not think about the tree, she could not even think about him. His touch consumed her.

He smiled against her ear.

Then he pulled away.

Hermione crooked her jaw. “Oh no, you bloody well don’t.”

She turned on her heel and grabbed a fistful of his jumper, looking up and right into his pale grey eyes. She walked into him, and he stepped back. She tugged him this way and that way to avoid walking into any furniture, and he trusted her guidance. He trusted her until she walked him against the sofa and his calves hit the seat, knees buckling. She pushed him down, and he had yet to get comfortable before Hermione straddled him.

He smiled crookedly, raising an eyebrow at her. “Granger, I never knew you had it in you.”

She rolled her eyes. They had done a whole lot more than hugging and walking backward in a room in the past few years. “You’re a tosser, you know that, don’t you?”

“I do. You remind me at least once every morning at breakfast.”

She held his face in her hands and nuzzled his cheek, smiling. “Because you don’t take your tea right.”

“ _ You’re _ the one who pours the milk—”

Smiling, she pecked his lips. She felt his smirk curl beneath her lips.


End file.
